Replica Resource

Formula One racing is special. At the very pinnacle of motor racing, it is the single minded pursuit of ruthlessly pared down objectives to the very extreme: mainly, driver survivability and performance. Not so much the brute performance of fantastical machines rigged to break land-speed records, but insanely agile machines that blip from rest to 100kph in two seconds, powering on to 160kph and coming to a full stop in five; or whipping around corners with such violence as to subject car and driver to G-forces akin to those experienced by fighter pilots. So keenly is F1 racing balanced on the knife edge between sport and suicide, that F1 cars, and necessarily the men who drive them, are nothing like the ones we encounter on public roads, even if there has been a steady migration of F1-derived technologies towards improving the conventional road car, and too many drivers who ape their F1 idols in everyday driving. Indeed, the gulf is appreciable: as F1 cars are a different breed, so are the men who drive them for a living, somewhat special. In particular, Rubens Barrichello is more special than most. While the world of F1 has been rocked lately by Lewis Hamilton, the brightest new start in F1 in a long time, who very nearly achieved the unthinkable, of winning the driver’s championship in his rookie season, it is Rubens Barrichello, quietly going the distance, who commands a deeper appreciation, like an exquisite drink with a long finish. He is the most experienced F1 driver on the grid, with 15 years in the business—and that is not counting his highly successful pre-F1 racing career, in some seasons, racing with his father’s driving license because he was simply under aged. His has been a terrific F1 career which has seen him ranked five times among the top five in the world championship, with two runner up titles in 2002 and 2004 while driving for Ferrari with Michael Schumacher, 61 podium finishes, 510 points, nine wins and 13 pole positions, though a driver’s championship still eludes him.In the hyper-competitive world of F1 racing, where fractions of a second can mean the difference between victory, defeat or disaster, it takes extreme resilience to stay this long in the running, because just as every component in an F1 car must perform at the highest level while taking tremendous punishment in every race, so is the driver under extreme physical strain and mental pressure.

The driver’s instinct, the daredevil’s nerve and the athlete’s focus and resilience—there is no instant that these must be allowed to lapse. In this light, Rubens Barrichello’s demonstrated staying power in such a punishing sport is nothing short of phenomenal. But this is not all: Barrichello is also the only link left on the grid to a bygone era of F1 racing, as the sole F1 driver who has raced against Ayrton Senna and Alain Proust. This May, in Turkey, Rubens clocked the 257th start of his F1 career, beating Riccardo Patrese’s 256 races, a record that stood for 14 years. To mark this achievement, Audemars Piguet presented Rubens Barrichello with a unique Royal Oak Offshore Rubens Barrichello Chronograph in Istanbul, which is also where the first Royal Oak Offshore Rubens Barrichello was launched in 2006.

The one-off Royal Oak Offshore Rubens Barrichello Chronograph is not so different from the earlier watch, powered by the same caliber 2326/2840 self-winding chronograph movement, and it remains a motorsport-inspired rendition of the Royal Oak Offshore, one of the most powerfully masculine yet suitably refined men’s chronographs on the market. In a red gold case and ceramic bezel to best protect the watch for knocks and scratches, racing-inspired design details include eight bezel stress screws reminiscent of engine screws, the bezel joint designed in the image of a ventilated disc brake, strap attachments in the shape of pedals, a fluted crown in titanium with ceramic insert akin to the gear cog and ceramic push-pieces in the form of air extractors.

In addition, complementing the engraved caseback is a ceramic medallion bearing the inscription “R. Barrichello – 257 – New Grand Prix Record.” Indeed, congratulations Mr. Barrichello and Godspeed—may you take the championship and may Audemars Piguet fashion a new watch to celebrate it.